Christmas is over ...

Christmas is over and now it’s New Years Eve. Another year is ending. I had a nice dinner with my family on Christmas. Turkey was tasty but the cake that I usually bake, that cake did not turn up good as usually. I had some missing ingredients. Basically grocery stores closed way too soon this year on Christmas Eve. I tried to get into Basic Foods grocery store, but it was closed even before 7 p.m. It was strange. As if they do not have enough food to sell? I do not get it. Or do they just force people to go to restaurants?

May be it’s just a big conspiracy, I do not know. I was shocked, as I tried to buy some stuff for my Christmas dinner and ”kissed” the locked doors. I did not want to buy food at a variety store and I decided to manage as is and I managed all right just my cake did not turn up as good as usually.

Well, it’s not the last Christmas I hope. There will be much more holidays I am sure, more nice turkeys and cakes. Next time I’ll do better, I promise. I did not have any guests anyway, just my family, so it’s okay. And now it’s the end of the year, I probably should stop here my writing and finish tomorrow. I do not have to work tomorrow so I can continue my narration easily. I just do not want to postpone it till next year.

It’s funny. Today is the year 2009 and in an hour it will be 2010.

I have not accomplished a lot in the year 2009. Same job, same old people around. Did not go anywhere for holidays – no funds for that. May be next year. Always the next year.

What should it be like a New Year resolution? I do not know. I do not want to plan too much. May be get some education in something useful, or get a license in translation, that’s long overdue.

Or may be just to buy a new TV, old one is gone.

Or to go somewhere I’ve never been.

Or to get some courage and buy a house, though in the last case I need more money than courage.

Somehow I do not anticipate more money next year. Well, I think I’ll be all right anyway. I have a job. I am healthy. I did not catch that scary swine virus in the year 2009, that’s good.

Inflation is up. But Canadian politicians declared the end of a crisis, so may be somebody else in my family will get a job too…

Prices are up too. Yesterday I wanted to buy some caviar for my holiday sandwiches, but when I got into a small Russian grocery store, I noticed the sign: 200g of genuine black caviar - $299.

I told the store girl: “You have a mistake on your label, it’s supposed to be $2.99 or something and she responded:” No, no mistake, it’s the right price”. Indeed!

No caviar for me, sorry, not rich enough.

Some smoked salmon sandwiches will do all right.

In my old country there was such a word “to get” something, that word had a very broad meaning.

If you do not have something, but you need it and you cannot go to the store and just buy it, you can “get” it if you know the right people, who could “get” it for you.

Well, I did not “get” inexpensive caviar this year; do not know the right people in Canada.

That means I will be deprived of my rights as a citizen to have the food that I want on my New Years Eve (just kidding). I do not care less. I will be happy with my salmon and cheese sandwiches and a glass of wine and with people who are dear to me around.

Cheers! See you in a year!

I find it annoying...

It’s so annoying; I cannot even say it. I do not have time to write anything. Today I was so tired; I was sitting just watching an old movie. I love old movies from 1950s and earlier. I adore Betty Davis. She is so full of inner charm and energy, that she attracts you and draws your attention.
It was that phrase that caught my attention. One man was singing something like “You had a feeling that you wanted to go and you had a feeling that you wanted to stay”… Something like that, very funny and at the same time to the point. We all sometimes have I am sure emotions like that. When we feel that we have to go, we want to go, but at the same time we want to stay. We just want the situation change and go away by some miracle, so we could stay, because we do not really want to go… Well, if you never experience something like that then you will probably won’t understand.
For so many years I’ve been living in a situation when I felt like I desperately want to go somewhere, but I did not at the same time wanted to leave my family and go away. You see, when you do something what you do not really want to do just because circumstances make you do that, and you are afraid to do otherwise, you little by little create a situation in which you are not comfortable, not satisfied, do not want to stay.
You start looking for solutions and find yourself trapped in that position that basically you yourself created, if you know what I mean. You become completely dissatisfied, trapped in it, you are trying to find a reasonable solution, but do not see that. You feel obligations, somebody is counting on you, your husband, children, relatives, you have a job you are afraid to loose etc. You continue to live and feel miserable, but do not see the red light that says: THE EXIT. You could live for many years like that and it’s the worst favour you could do to yourself.
If you are not changing the situation, then the situation will change you and not to your advantage.
You are going to loose your faith in yourself and in your ability to change things to the better. I do not think that I am unique in that, I think many people, women especially do that mistake. They allow the situation to control them and screw their lives big time. Because you cannot change the past and years that you left behind should be the happy ones, ones you’d like to remember and cherish.
Then your life is worth living.
Though I find it really annoying sometimes that you cannot change the past.

A happy childhood, what is it?

Perhaps to understand that you should at least experience it. I did not have o lot of it. At nine years of age my childhood was over. My youngest brother got really sick and I had to take care of him because my mother had to work and there was no one else to take care of him but me and I was just 9.

My mother could not cope with the tragedy. She literally fell apart. I became his second mother. I cooked for him, fed him, because he could not take care of himself. I sang him songs and read stories and I called him my son because my mother called him that.

I loved him very much too, I wanted him to be alive, healthy and happy but there was no help for him in my country at that time and no financial support. My parents had to work and I had to take care of him and to go to school too.

And in her grief my mother forgot that I was a child still, that at 9 years of age you cannot behave like a grown up, you cannot think like a grown up. You need some support you need somebody to share your doubts, concerns and troubles.

At my age I did not think my mother loved me at all. I thought that she was not my real mother, that she adopted me from somebody else. She could never find time to stop, hug me and just tell: I love you, I need you, I cannot live without you.

It would be very simple to say that and I needed those words and I waited for them for many ears but my mother never said them.

She never told me that she loved me and I do not know why.

I am sure that she loved me but it's too late now. She is not in this world with me any more and I cannot ask her anything. But every time I have a chance I am telling my children over and over again: I love you, I need you, I cannot live without you, because I do not want them ever to doubt that.

Drop the mentality of a Martian.

I wonder if you really could preserve your unique national features that reflect what you are as a grown person who came from another country with different traditions, customs, holidays, and way of life?
You emerge from all of that into a different lifestyle, different traditions, and customs. And there is no way around that. Either you have to embrace all new stuff into your every day life or just live like an outcast, hermit, oddity, laughable and pitiful, clinging desperately to your local diaspora of people with same language and cultural origin and way of life or misunderstanding and denying all sense of their new way of life.
It is especially hard to the people of 50+ when age becomes a barrier together with the new language that they do not know. Without a cultural support they might fall into depression and feel like they are useless and worthless. They desperately need to find some place of their own in this new life where they do feel more comfortable and more at home.
It's easer when they have a support of their grown up children but what if not? If they do not have children, don’t know the language, they cannot find a job; they have to survive on a miserable social assistance (if any) and cannot get over language and cultural block.
Everything about your health and well being depends on how you feel. If you are busy with some meaningful occupation, you might not have enough time to feel lost and miserable or worthless. And everybody knows now that’s easer to keep physical health if your emotions are good.
It took me many years to stop feeling nostalgic and sad. I realized that even in a different culture I could find something that I might accept and like. For example things like Christmas and Halloween. Like window-shopping in a big mall. Or trip to the beach on a hot summer day. New traditions and new friends.
Part of me became different but part of me still the same. I still like the same things I loved in my old country, every morning I see the same face in the mirror (just a little bit older and wiser (I hope). But I know I have a taste for new things, I did not have before.
New books, movies, experience, I wouldnever have had in my old country. That’s what life is about and I accept that.
But I see how difficult it is for people who came here really old, at retirement age, may be being retired in their old country.
Yesterday I was passing by a grocery store around 8 o’clock in the morning. It was Sunday, the store was still closed, just about to be opened, but there was a small crowd of old immigrant people speaking Russian, standing there with big shopping bags, waiting for the store to open. Believe me, there is absolutely no necessity to do that on a nice sunny day, on Sunday, not in this country. There is no shortage or deficit of groceries in Toronto! But these people are so used to deficit and shortage in their old country, that they are afraid of doing otherwise.
They think that they might miss some products if they come later. They keep their life style even if there is no sense in it in this country. They do not even see any possibility for them here in their advanced age unable to notice that in this country their life could be completely different – at any age.
You just have to loose what I call the mentality of a Martian. When you think that either: they are idiots, I do not want to now their stupid language and culture (they do not have any) or: I am too old and stupid, do not have any memory, cannot learn anything etc., etc. In both cases it’s not true.
Of course to learn something new requires tremendous effort at any age. And the older you are the harder it is to change everything you are used and accustomed to and learn something completely new. But not impossible. And it’s worth it.
The new experience you’ll get and new possibilities, you’ll see are priceless. Well worth the fight. Even if you are fighting the same old... yourself. Please, believe me, you are not a Martian, it's the same planet Earth and we are all the same earthlings here though a little bit different here and there.

Just some thoughts about transportation...

When I came to Canada I was so surprised that there are so many cars on the streets, all kinds of models and it looked like everybody had it and some people had like two or three in the garage and on a driveway. It looked so strange to me.
Again in some residential areas we did not even had walking areas, just driveways and roads. You are not supposed to walk anywhere. It looked strange too.
You go outside, dive into your car and go! I was wondering, what if your car is broken or you just want to walk? What if you do not want to drive?
But having a car in this country looks like a necessity more than a luxury, more like a part of something that you are supposed to have anyway, like education, or watch on your hand or jewelry and make up if you are a woman, or an apartment. And if you do not have it, then something is wrong with you and you have to be ashamed of yourself. It should not be like that but sometimes it exactly how I feel.
I do not have a car and I use public transportation to go to work. It is okay in Toronto, we have plenty of buses and Subway, and we have GO trains and even streetcars in downtown area.
But still when everybody around you driving you feel like you are missing something. A tooth maybe.
I never had a feeling like that in my old country. My husband and I, we had a car for sometime and then it started having problems and we sold it and that’s it. It was not a big deal and to keep it and repair was a big hassle.
But here in Canada, you sort of have to have it, or else. It’s hard to explain but it’s true. It’s almost like you are an invalid or something and I do not like that feeling. My problem is that I do not want to spend all that money on something that breaks, causes trouble, takes so much money from you and have to be replaced in 10 years anyway, so what’s the point to have it?
But I am just a reluctant immigrant do not judge me that hard, please.

Why do I feel depressed in this country?

I can go around for months working, doing my own business and then suddenly something triggers and I feel, painfully and clearly feel that I am a reluctant immigrant here and it probably will never be totally my country. I do not know why I feel like that.
It’s a good country; it’s a first class country. You can have and get and accomplish a lot here. Why the heck do I feel like that? I’ve been here for so many ears it’s time to get used to it, to feel at home here. But no, something always reminds me: no, you are just a guest here; it’s not yours and never will be.
Sometimes I think that may be I should leave and go somewhere else to live, may be I will be happy somewhere in a different place. I am content here but something definitely missing and it is very subtle and I cannot put words to it. Just a feeling of not belonging, of being alien. And it is very strange because basically I do not have a reason to feel like that. I am quite healthy, I have a job, I do not live on a street homeless. I do not have terrible addictions, diseases some people struggle with. I have no reason to feel bad. But I still feel like looking for something dear that I lost in my life and cannot find no matter how hard I am looking.
I am not happy and none of my kids are. My middle son actually suffers from severe depression. It scares me and I feel like I did something wrong.
May be coming to this country was wrong. May be leaving all my life good or bad behind was wrong. I cannot change that. I cannot by miracle make my children small again and take them back to my old country, I do not feel like going back myself, not anymore.
You cannot go back into the past. And I try not to dwell on the past too much, not to be depressed myself.
I am still trying to explain, why in my country where people did not have a lot of necessary things, were deprived from many things, people still were not depressed and I knew a lot of quite happy people there.
And here we can have everything, and so many unhappy and depressed people around including my own children. I still cannot solve that mystery and it bothers me. I never expected that.
May be its just fear of loosing something of not having it tomorrow. Your job, your money, your apartment, friends. You loose your job – you loose a lot, because you loose your credit and there is no more accustomed life style, you have to start all over again.
May be constant stress, that’s why people are not happy there. The necessity of struggling all the time, of stressful lifestyle, I do not know. I myself have to work 6 days a week and I still cannot afford a car and it bothers me sometimes, why?
May be the necessity of keeping up the high standard of living that makes our life miserable and sad, and stressful.
May be it is just a grand illusion, a hypnosis we should wake up from. Well, if I’ll be able to solve the mystery, I’ll tell you but not now. Now I am still looking for the answer.

A special treat for a turkey or how to use it to the last bite

I have a tendency to write about sad things and at the same time I do not like sad things, I like the happy things. So I decided to write about the good old roasted turkey for a change. Yes, ladies and gentleman, turkey.

I am kind of curious. Does anybody know what to do with it after Thanksgiving day is over? When no one wants to look at it as a meal anymore and there is still plenty of it left?
For me it was a problem once, because, you see, in my old country there was a tradition to cook a goose not turkey on a holiday and I started with that in Canada.

But that damn goose that I cooked in Canada looked like he flew from Eastern Europe to Canada without a single stop and just drop dead from the sky at Canadian border and was shoveled from there to a Toronto grocery and not just looked - tasted the same. So I did not have a choice but to drop the tradition and start cooking turkey as everybody else. After some trial and error I managed to produce a pretty decent dish- roasted evenly with nice brown (golden brown) skin, crunchy and tasty and spicy on outside and juicy and tasty inside.
But the problem was what to do the next day? I do not have big eaters in my family and next day after staying in the fridge it is not juicy any more and it loses its flavor too, becomes more and more dry. I worked a plan, which I want to share t with you, my patient readers.

Plan A. When plenty of white meat is still there.
Turkey sandwich.
You will need good multigrain bread. Not the cheapest kind, not too soft. You slice the white meat as well as you can, not very thinly. You spread some mustard on a slice of your bread if you like mustard or some hot sauce if you want it to be spicy.
Put couple of slices of turkey on that peace of bread, put your favorite lettuce on top or spinach, couple of red onion rings, spread some mayonnaise on another slice of bread, put some other marinated vegetables on top if you want, or pepper spread (they sell things like that in jars in Canada, if you like peppers, put everything together and enjoy (m-m-m-m! I want it. I want it now!).
Plan B. If only dark meat left around bones.
If you still have lots of chunks of bite size meat, you can create some fast food dish from it. Quick bites I call it.
Into a bowl you break 2 raw eggs, add pinch of salt and pepper, some dry herbs (half of a teaspoon), half a cup of milk or water, two tablespoons of any regular flour. Blend everything; the consistency should be like for pancakes, so you can coat your bites evenly with mixture.
Put two cups of small pieces of turkey leftovers into the mixture and mix thoroughly, so bites are coated with it.
Heat the deep frying pan with generous amount of vegetable oil hit it to the boiling point. Do not burn the oil, as soon as it is heated, lower temperature like in half and put coated bites of turkey in it. Turkey is not raw so you cook it couple of minutes on one side, flip it over and cook again till golden crust on both sides formed, take it out, drain on a paper towel (better) and let it cool down a little. It ‘s ready to disappear in you mouth.
Plan C. Just a little meat left around bones or it is too dry.
You can grind it in a regular blender with good blades, if you do not have a grinder and add some fresh parsley, white onions, you favorite spices, jalapeno peppers without seeds.
I usually use :

• 1 cup of leftover pieces of turkey, or chicken,
• 1 onion small (1/2 big one)
• 2-3 clothes of garlic,
• half a teaspoon of dry spices(black pepper,garlick,oregano,anything).

I grind it smoothly in a small blender. I have to use it couple of times, as it really is small.
I cook 450 grams of spaghetti, linguini, penne pasta, any pasta that cooks longer and stays harder (not like vermicelli, or Chinese noodles), drain it, put it into stir-fry frying pan with a little bit of vegetable oil, fry it like 2 minutes, add my grinded turkey with onion and spices blended and fry a minute more, long enough to mix everything and turn the heat off. Add more salt if you like. The dish is ready to serve.
Makes a very generous amount for 3- 4 people. That’s it. Bon appetite!
Nothing left from that big turkey, just bones. Okay, don’t expect me to cook the bones. Just discard them or invite your neighbor’s dog, if he (the neighbor of course) does’ not mind.
And wait for the next occasion to cook a big turkey. Happy Thanksgiving, guys, past, present and future one!

There is no place like home

I have got absolutely the craziest idea I think. I decided that I have to buy a house in Toronto to live there with my family. You do not have to tell me that I am nuts.

House in Toronto, Canada, right now is about $300,000 approximately and it is quite average, 3 bedroom house. Nothing special.
I do not have a down payment money nor a good salary. Just my crazy wish. I just think that I have to. I cannot live in the apartment for the rest of my life with rental prices going up every year. That means that I will have to downsize pretty soon and again and again and end up in somebody else’s basement apartment that I hate to do.

I imagine myself being weak and climbing other peoples’ stairs in the basement.

When we came to Canada we bought a house in a small town B*** Ontario and lived there for 10 years and due to family circumstances had to sell it and move to Toronto, back to the big city.
I cannot tell that I regret I sold it, though I regret that I bought it for sure. It was a lemon, you know and a big one. It was tremendously overpriced, I (my family)bought it approximately for 20,000 dollars more than we should and we bought it like a rent to own program that was a b*s* because we just had to have more mortgage on that overpriced old junk, that's what we did and to pay for it for 25 years what we did not. It was a real “money pit” like in a movie. Only in a movie they managed to restore and replace everything very nicely and we did not. We did not have money, any money.

My husband was driving a truck to US and back at that time and I was stuck with my 3 kids without a job or possibility of it in a small town in a new country in that century home (it was built in 1892(or something?), no one knew for sure and had some features that have never been replaced. It had some charm though. It had high ceilings with genuine crown moldings in the living, dining rooms and in the hall. It had yellow brick walls darkened by time and pollution very nicely. Natural though painted wood all over the place.
Nice wooden floor covered by cheap broadloom wall to wall covering all wear and tear made by time and usage. We had genuine brass chandelier in the living room, very heavy. I constantly was afraid that it might go down and kill somebody.
Walls in the basement were so old that plaster or whatever it was there was dripping as the sand of a seashore if you would touch it.

In a bad weather when wind was blowing effortlessly through the house, windows were singing their moaning song, as if somebody was crying: release us, replace us, we are s-o-o old… In a big wind shingles from the roof were flying around and I prayed that there will be some of it still left after the storm , that not all of the roof will fly away.
Lucky for us we usually did not have tornadoes in our area. The heating costs were just staggering. When my husband was on the road in winter and kids at school, I used to sit at my computer with winter jacket on and a hat, turning down the thermostat as low as humanly possible, so my cat was looking at my jacket with envy.

In a bad frosty weather all pipes would be frozen and you could hardly squeeze some water from it. So you have tons of frozen water outside(snow) and no water inside to cook or take a shower! Nice. All plumbers we called periodically to help us with our problem would tell us all kind of fairy tales regarding pipe conditions and some of them even ventured into replacing process. Eventually they had to dig a big trench in our driveway and take out all outside pipes, that were full of tree roots and could not let water through no matter what. The procedure eased our pocket by $5,000 but no more frozen pipes in winter – Hallelujah!

To make our life in the house more thrilling, my nice kids one day decided to go camping in the basement( they had nice playground area there). So naturally they needed a fire. Everybody knows you need a fire in on a campground! They came home for lunch and made a fire in the basement and left. The results were devastating. We did not have money to move out so we had to stay and do renovations after the fire. It was a nightmare for 4 months but we survived the fire and the renovations and everything.

Now when I look back I miss my old drafty house, I long for it. I know my kids miss it too. Because it was our home, it was our life. It was hard and it was beautiful. As life is. We had good things and bad things and good things were more…I’ve been living in my mom’s house or my own for the most part of my life and when I lost it, I thought it is going to be okay, less worries about the roof and furnace and bills, but now I feel that I lost something else, something bigger and more important, that you cannot replace and I need that. My place that I can call my home. MINE. JUST MINE...

And I am determined to do that, just do not know how to realize my dream yet. Not yet. But I will have to figure it out. Well, I accept that I have to buy a house in a pretty miserable condition, but I agree to that and I have experience now, and interest will be considerably higher then normally bank would give me and I agree to that too.

I just need some time so I can save some money for closing costs if not for down payment.
But I’ll buy my own home and make it nice, swear to god, I’ll do that, no matter what, because there is no place like home, there is no place like home.

The most ancient meal on Earth...

I guess people invented bread when they started to collect grains and cultivate them. It's an ancient meal. Meal people ate by itself, with wine, cheese and later as a sandwich. Bread has a special meaning for me.

In my country you are not allowed to neglect it, to throw it away or step on it, it's sacrilege.

If you do not want it, you feed it to the animals or give it to the birds in the park. Or slice it thinly and dry in the oven, sprinkle some spices on it and give it as a snack to your children when they are hungry. Or if nobody wants it - dry it, grind it and make breadcrumbs for your cooking needs. You just do not waste it.

It is a lot of labor to create good wholesome bread and people cherish the creation if not the creator.

My mom used to send me to the bakery when I was fairly small and I would come home carrying still warm "brick", as we called it after its form, inhaling its wonderful nourishing smell, stealing some peaces of crust and nibbling on it.

My mom would never say anything for "spoiling" the bread, no matter how badly I mutilated it on my way home, because when she would go to buy bread she would do exactly the same, tearing the warm pieces of crust and nibbling on it.

It was irresistible. It was rye bread, dark golden brown and very delicious. We had white bread too. It had golden crust and was heavy and tasty too, but I liked the brown one better. I don’t know, may be in your childhood everything tastes better, may be your appetite is different. Though I should say I did not have any appetite at all as a child. I was thin, sickly and constantly with sore throat and something like measles – things you usually do not have as an adult. Pretty pathetic. But I was not a sad child or depressed, that came later.

I liked Nature and could be lost for hours among trees, flowers, birds and other small animals. Nature is still may major way to get some relaxation; forget the stress of everyday life.

But I think I stepped aside from my narration. I just wanted to say that bread was a very meaningful part of a meal in my old country, a necessity to have and eat with a soup or second course.

At one time I remember (long ago, when I was a small child), we had it on the tables of all diners and restaurants all the time, thinly sliced small pieces of bread with salt and mustard jars on the plate. If you do not have enough money to order a good meal, you at least can supplement your meager dinner with some bread. Not a bad idea. But as everything that is too good, it did not last long...

Sometimes when I come to the bakery, I can manage to find bread that looks almost like one from my childhood, but it never tastes the same. I understand that and do not complain. I have lots of things in this country that I never had in my childhood and would probably die for it then just to have it. Life is full of compensations and I remember that.

But I still miss that bread and the people who served it to me.

A confession of a pathetic person.

I am a coward. I am a coward and a sucker, because I betray myself every single day of my life just because, I do not have courage to finish it all. And I am not talking about physical killing myself; I am not talking about physical suicide. I am talking about moral suicide, when every day of your life you are spending doing what somebody else needs to be done but not you. I am talking about that miserable drudgery that life can be when you spending it as an employee.

When you have to get up in the morning and do the same thing over and over again every day at the same time. If you watched that brilliant movie Groundhog Day you understand what I mean, and if you do not, please do watch it, as it exactly shows what life is for people like me. You can vivisect 24 hours of your life into little clutches of time and most of that time is wasted on unimportant things, unimportant for you.
At the end of the day you have not accomplished anything, you just earned some money to survive that’s all. And it pisses me off a big time. Between things I would rather do and things I have to do to survive there is a big gap I cannot close, because I do not know how.

I do not hate my job. My employers are very decent people who are struggling every day to stay in their business and put their hearts and souls to it. They immigrants like me; the only difference is that I am their employee.

Well, I should not complain. Thing could be much worse. Not to have a job as an immigrant is a disaster. At least I can pay my rent and at the end of a day I can have my outdated computer and high speed Internet (the only indulgences I could not live without). But deep down I consider myself a coward. Because I am scared to change my life, I tied myself to employee position and do not see any other option, not for me, never. And if for some reason I will lose my job, I will go and find another, sucker as I am.
A JOB (Just Over Broke). Isn’t it pathetic?

I still feel different in this country.

After so many years, I still feel different in this country. I am from a different world, but I am a human being not a Martian.
When I came to Canada I made a huge mistake. I never followed my education. Somehow I forgot a very important thing that I am from a different country and I am not going to be treated equally from educational point of view at least, I have to prove my credibility and my diploma and that means that I have to reestablish my diploma and that means more education, more courses, more programs. I could not use my diploma and that was really disappointing. I needed some extra education and I did not do any of that.
The problem was that in my country education at that time was free , even university education. You just have to pass the exams to be eligible. In Canada I had to pay money, I could not afford that. I decided to take some practical courses in a vocational school so I could find some job in whatever I get training for. I finished my courses in 4 months instead of a year. It was a joke, completely useless and worthless. I still owe them money. I refused to pay for the b*s they gave me.
Accidentally I found a job in some translating company of Quebec but unfortunately I lost it as quickly as I found it. Simply put I did not have enough experience to work in Canada. I was not ready for it. I was very disappointed but I learned my lesson and gradually learned how to work in Canada.
We moved by a chance to B**d, Ontario. A small town, lost to the world. It was not a wise decision at all. Small town, no jobs. NO JOBS ABSOLUTELY.
My husband started a new business, my help needed, I agreed. Reluctantly. I wanted to do something else, surely I was good at something, but there was no chance even to try. I felt depressed at the end of a rope...
I started helping my husband, learned how to use a computer and bookkeeping - the last thing I wanted to do, but again, nobody asked my opinion. You do what you have to do. It felt like a prison sentence. I "served my time" for 10 years...
From time to time I wrote articles to the Russian newspapers in Toronto, but I did it for free and eventually I stopped. I did some creative writing but never published anything, never tried anyway.
I think I lost it big time. If you come educated you must keep it, sustain it. You should not go and work at the factory or bakery. Work like that kills your energy your creativity, your spirit and the ability to grow.
Assembly line kills your brain, your will to create something new. You have to find the means to educate yourself until you have enough credentials to get a meaningful job or a business viable and sustainable.
You have to learn the language of the country you are living in, it’s a must. Sacrifice a lot, get into bad debts if you have to but get onto your level, level you are comfortable with. It’s your obligation towards yourself and your family. In your new home you have to live with the same level of dignity if not more as you had in your old country.
A doctor should not drive a cab, a professor should not clean the dog kennels. It such a waste of human life, I cannot even find right words for it, just despicable.
It’s like you are going into a debt to yourself. You can change your profession in a different country but it should be compatible with what you had, no less.
You should not put yourself down for the sake of survival because survival in a civilized country is a little bit more than just putting bread on the table or roof over your head. We came to this country for a better life. We should never forget that.
And don’t call me a snob or something, because I am not. It’s just that you have to use god’s given talents in this world and not to sell yourself short. That’s what I did and I regret that. Big time.

Being immigrant, being different

When you come from a different world you cannot help feeling differently. You are used to dress a certain way, to talk and behave differently and on top of everything your mother tongue is... yeah, you guessed right it is different.

You suddenly realize, that you came to the world that is not like your own. You feel as if somebody stripped you naked up to your soul and left you exposed in the crowd and you have nothing to cover your body and your soul with. You feel shame and humiliation and urge to shout: people, please, wait a minute, I am not that different from you, just help me a little, push me into right direction, I’ll learn I am not stupid, I have some merits, I just need some time, be patient with me.

I am convinced that everybody lives in an emotional and social bubble/box and breaking out of this box can be very painful. You are surrounded by people you know and who know you and you expect them to behave a certain way and you behave a certain way towards them too.

You can love them or hate but their behavior to the most extent predictable and that predictability gives comfort and you do not have to feel depressed and stressful.

If you an immigrant (alien) your surroundings lack that familiarity, it takes time.

You gradually learn language and habits, you find new friends who morally support you. You can vent and cry on their shoulder. They understand.

You learn how to make a living in a new country.

Sometimes it's hard when you do not have new skills, or your skills are not enough, you need some extra learning, or you need something completely different.

When I came to Canada I had a University degree but with 3 small kids and my diploma meant next to nothing in Canada. I found a job as a translator but lost it right away for some stupid reason just because I did not know some trifle things.

With time comes the experience and gradually you forget what was so bad in your country, you remember good days only, you feel nostalgia and regret.

Finally you come back as a tourist and everybody treats you as a guest and you do not see any place there for yourself, you indeed is a tourist.

You come back into your new country more relaxed and glad you returned. You see the differences and understand them. You want other people to see everything with your eyes and share your experience with others.

And you join something like http://www.hubpages.com/ and you write about your experience and wisdom, your ups and downs.

And you do not feel like you are in a box anymore because your box suddenly expanded and it includes now a lot of people who are ready to listen and willing to understand, criticize you or applaud to you and with you.

You do not feel like a stupid immigrant in a box, but as a normal human being with lots of ideas you cannot wait to convey to others.

And it feels great.

Too tired to write...

This week I am completely flat and cannot write anything, my mind is blank and refuses to cooperate, so I fill like a total dummy. May be I should write some manual. Something for Dummies, or what should you do when you cannot do anything anymore? I cannot even reprint my material I’ve been writing before and was going to post. I’ll try to do it tomorrow, if I can. But as I have to work tomorrow I have no idea if I’ll be able to accomplish that. So if somebody expected something new, wait till next time, please. I am done for today. I need rest. I still managed to post something into Hubpages, I am absolutely in love with them. Here is my link if you are curious.
http://hubpages.com/_HG5/hub/yourmoneyanddignity_
I hope it will work as I am not familiar with all that link producing technique.
I'll just leave you a picture I made recently and that's it.

New pill, doctor? Will I have fun with it?

I am a Canadian citizen since 1997, but I still do not feel like I belong here. I always feel like a visitor, who for some unknown reason has been hold in here for too long. I live in Canada but part of me still lives in a different place, probably the place that does not exist any more. But that’s I think the cost of immigration, you have to accept it and play by new rules but you cannot help it you want to criticize those rules if you do not understand them.

I have a big issue with medical service in Canada. In a big city like Toronto god forbid, if you need some emergency or just after hours help, you can hardly get any of it on time, when you need it. Of course the ambulance will come pretty quick but then they will take you in emergency room and if you are not having heart attack or bleeding severely, you’ll be waiting for some doctor to attend to you for hours. May be they hope you somehow get better and just go home, without bothering the doctor, I don’t know. Sometimes it’s exactly how it feels.

I remember once my son who was 15 at that time developed a stomach pain so we called ambulance and we were sitting in the hall there for 3 hours in the middle of a night. Finally my son felt better and I told him: are you better? Let’s go home, I have to go to work in the morning. So we just left and I still do not know what was the problem with his stomach. Every time you go to a family doctor, you have to sit in a row for an hour or more before you can get to the doctor, and all he has just 10 minutes before he shovels you out with some pills. How wonderful! And if the pills do not help you can always go back, sit more and get another pill plus some pills for side effects if you have any. Most doctors are completely ignorant about the miracles of healthy nutrition and almost never give you a sound advice regarding it. Eat everything and in moderation is not working in certain occasions when you are having sugar or some other food addiction or just used to eat wrong type of food, or have a crazy life style etc.

Most babies come into this world amazingly healthy and what happens next? What do we do to our kids, why don’t we teach they healthy habits? They grow up looking for fun. I hate this word fun. I think we use it too much in this country. Not everything is a fun and kids should realize that early. May be then we’ll have less depressed teenagers in this country. They go to the doctors and trust them and then they get hooked on some vicious antidepressants and become dependant, they need more and more and cannot stop. Depression real or imaginary gets worse.

It’s a shame dear doctors, because we have by Nature, God, or whatever you believe into, build in amazing ability to get better no matter what with doctors or no doctors, pills or no pills, sometimes by determination and mere willpower. It’s in our power to make us healthy. Just do not mess with you health, please. And do not let doctors do that just because they need more patients and more money.
I sincerely wish doctors to be paid when a patient have recovered after the treatment AND ONLY THEN. Then they would work efficiently I think. May be in future it will happen. Right now by nature of their profession doctors have tremendous power to save us and to harm us at the same time and it is not a good thing.

That’s my reluctant immigrant’s opinion. I do not trust doctors especially here in Canada, where medicine is severely commercialized. I never go to any annual or whatever check up. I try to live healthy; it is not always possible, as I cannot protect myself from stress. But before I am really sick I am not going to go to any doctor, just forget about it. I’ll take my chances. At least he is not going to harm me. And I will try to help myself as long as I can. Stupid? May be. Sorry, but I have my reasons.

Immigration of an educated person

In a way I was a lucky immigrant. I came to Canada with landed immigrant papers (my husband did everything, I just signed the papers). I did not have to fight and suffer and pay lawyers thousands of dollars of last money and prove anything. I came to Canada, signed something and was free to go. Welcome to Canada! It was easy.

But there is another not less important side to immigration – psychological. Adaptation to life in a society completely different, when you have to move from one way of life to another, from one social structure to completely different is not easy. Shock is imminent. Step from broken socialism to unknown capitalism with 3 small kids in tow. No money, limited language.

I could not speak English when I came. I was English-Russian technical translator; I could decently translate from one language to another on paper, but no spoken language. It took me about 5 years before I stopped being afraid to open my mouth and say something. That ingrained fear to say something wrong haunted me. It’s difficult, when you cannot say something what you want to say, cannot express yourself properly as educated person should. It gives you deep sense of inferiority. You look like a fool and feel the same.

If you do a lot of mistakes in your speech, people do not trust you. You do not sound like an educated person and people tend to look down on you. Not only that, when you are immigrant you do not know how to behave socially, you do not know simple things, like what to eat, cook, how to wash your clothes and with what, products are different and oh, boy, these products are plenty!

I remember my first visit to a big supermarket. There was one, called Knob Hill Farms, if I am not mistaken. It’s gone now. It was really a monster supermarket; I was completely lost there. In socialist country in a northern area we lived we used just cabbage for fresh vegetables and dry apples for fresh fruits in winter. We were ecstatic when we managed to buy some lemons in December and I still remember that smell of a first spring cucumber; when you slice it thinly and do not want to eat it, just smell that fresh aroma promising summer.

As kids we used to get a present on New Year’s Eve. A bag full of candies in colorful wrappings, couple of walnuts and an orange or mandarin. Many years passed by I still have to smell the orange before I eat it. It took me I think about 10 years living in Canada to get used to the fact that food is always around and it is not going to disappear tomorrow. It’s still hard to throw food away. It is sacred. It’s ingrained in my system.

One immigrant girl I know told me once, that for many years she would come to fast food restaurant and steal some packages of salt and pepper and ketchup, because she could not understand that they are “free” and that tomorrow they still be there.

Now she is a businesswoman and do not steal any packages of anything but that’s how mentality works. In a "pure" socialist country everything belongs to the government. That means nobody directly personally controls you. Centralized distribution means not enough of anything when you need it. At the same time this very thing you need might be rotting somewhere, but you are not getting it, it’s not there for you where you need it. There is shortage of everything.

People would say: collective means mine. It’s just socialist mentality. Taking something that belongs to the government is not stealing. Of course if you steal big time, you could go to prison. But attitude is the same. If it belongs to government, it’s mine and I can take it if I need.

Though political indiscretions have been punished more severely. Capitalism was enemy #1, business in any form was illegal. Illegal businesses existed all the time, but you had to hide it pretty good...

Of course Gorbachev changed all that but he already could not help it. Socialistic mechanism started loosing its wheels. Artificial “society for people” collapsed, painful and hateful capitalism was reborn again. Big monster USSR ceased to exist. Enemy #1 became way of life. People started to emigrate in droves, running out, from poverty, political games, discrimination, wars, confusion, what not, you name it.

It’s hard to leave everything and start all over again. It’s not easy for those who left and not easy for people who stayed. System collapsed but mentality still there and nostalgia, for the better that existed in reality or in make believe and for the broken dreams.

Many people believed into socialism and still do, especially in the countries that never experienced the reality of it. But I hope for the better future. We will change mentality, we’ll learn how to cherish what we have and create better life here, over there, anywhere. Our future right here, right now and we’ll learn from our mistakes and will be better. Here , there, anywhere.

Gotta be kidding...

Recently I made a startling discovery: people do not use their brains in Canada (do not know about US though). But in Canada…cross my heart, I am not kidding. They walk around with super clever and determined expression on their super clean faces, they ready to smile to you with their super white teeth and help you very readily with directions if you ask them. Just please-please, do not ask!!! They will very happily send you into absolutely wrong direction. And if you ask 3 people, be sure, they will send you into absolutely 3 different contradictory directions (I tried believe me). They do not want to tell you very simple words: I do not know. No, they feel better sending you somewhere, as they want to be polite. Even if your destination is just the next street, they will send you across town to completely different place to be sure. Another thing. They always treat you as if you have some sort of a skin disease or made from thin semitransparent glass. They are very careful not to touch you and if you accidentally walk too close to they will sway aside and say sorry, as if they afraid to catch something from you or to break you accidentally. They do not think why they do that. They do not like to think. If they have a problem, they will try to find a specialist and ask his advice. They do not risk their health by not taking medication. If they have as little headache, they would run to the doctor and diligently swallow all prescribed pills even if all they need just a good night sleep. Trouble with spending - call financial advisor, let him rule your financial life for you. Couple of pounds extra? Call diet doctor, he’ll find right diet for you. Cannot find a girlfriend/boyfriend, go to e-harmony, they will find a match for you (at least they claim they do). How much to pay for your happiness? Is somebody selling? I want a piece! They (Canadians) are not trying to find a solution to their problem by themselves; they are looking for somebody to deliver it to them. Please, help us we cannot change our diet, habits, preferences, tastes, routines. We so depressed, give us tons of pills never mind side effects. Diarrhea, insomnia, bleeding, high blood pressure, low blood pressure, that’s okay, as long as no depression, baby! We so scared of depression we have to stop it right away. We cannot think how ridiculous it is. Think? Let somebody else do that for us. And we will drink the solution for our problem like a glass of water, no matter what the price tag to that solution is. Is it fear or laziness, or fright to break the rules or just a bad habit of not thinking? Can they just trust their own judgment? I know there are exceptions, but as a rule they do not want to use their brains for what it suppose to be used: thinking.
Is it that their life is too comfortable, or may be conspiracy of food industry? Or is there something in tap water? I do not know yet. I must find a professional, some specialist, who will help. My brain is not working. Must have eaten something or just becoming a Canadian.

It may be a very wrong opportunity, baby…

Everybody is looking for something: love, money, ideas.

Let’s talk about money first. That d* thing always comes first nowadays.
Everything looks so easy on Internet. Just do plenty of surveys. What can be easier, people will pay you for your opinion, will they? Nope.
Not that easy, not the way it is presented in multiple programs and paid “opportunities”. I am guilty; I bought into that kind of “opportunity”. It’s easy, quick, and completely useless.

I bought survey program and earned “0”, a big one.
So just do not waste your time and money, however small, it is your money, you do not have to pay scamsters. You have to realize, that people who advertise these programs are either affiliates who are trying to make a quick sales cash, without even thinking, what the heck they are selling, or creators of the so called “opportunity”, who are making money by selling the program, knowing very well, that you are not going to make any money.

They are going to make money, by finding a sucker who will buy it. You can sign up to any big company for free, They need surveys on a regular basis and for your participation and if you qualify, they will give you some points, lottery draws (sweepstakes).
But most important, you have to qualify for a survey.

And if you are a green elephant living in Alaska, you might not qualify for that particular survey today or any other day for that matter. And if by some lucky chance they need opinions of green elephants today, you can earn couple of points instead of peanuts you would prefer.
And to earn these points you have to participate in a lot of surveys, as many as possible. Theoretically you could win some sweepstakes.

I once won $100 US. Unfortunately I got only $70; US government deducted $30 dollars for taxes.

I live in Canada, and do not clearly understand why should I pay US tax? But I got the rest and was happy. Anything helps.
US government needs more money than me anyway. That’s a well-known fact. They have to feed more people. My problem with that stuff is that if you divide the amount you can get on the time you spent to get it, it does not sound right.
You better sit on the corner, at a subway or busy market and beg, you’ll get more, just kinda embarrassing for most people.

Same with pay per click, or reading email.
I joined some of them, wasted some time, quit, or just dropped out, waste of time. If you are earning $0,00015 for reading email, how long will it take you to earn $10? I am still with Clixsense, though, it is more like a curiosity. They sent me $7.60 recently worth almost a year’s clicking. Now I upgraded, may be will get more and sooner. But they are reliable and you can trust them.

We have to understand that to earn money right away, like substantial money, you need to invest considerably and knowledgeably.
You need to know what you are doing, or you’ll be loosing a lot. You need not sacrifice your last penny.
You can take some learning curve; you can even join some good MLM. MLM is a good opportunity, if you know how to build it, or somebody is willing to show you how to do it right.
In a reputable company with good and in demand product you can start with very little money and in time make you business work for you.

In 5 years if you have sufficient support of your upline, you can build a successful business and help others to do the same. It’s a wonderful idea. The problem is that many people too greedy or in a rush to make money fast and they turn the legal business into illegal pyramid scam and ruin everything, quit, even go to jail.

If you have some skills and knowledge, you can sell that opportunity on line or off. Just do not go into affiliate marketing without thorough investigation, do not scam and spam people. It’s unethical and immoral. Some programs are just useless junk, not worth a dime.

Sales person and a scoundrel is not the same, though start with the same letter.
If you have some interesting information, write about it and give it to people. We live in the Informational Age.

Good information worth paying for and people will pay for it. And if you do not have any skills, you can always help people who does have it, or help somebody off the Net.
We used to have plenty of rich people before Internet Era. We never missed Internet then.
And one more thing: being broke is not a genetic disorder; it’s a choice (I did not say that!). And money does grow on trees. It’s called Tree of Knowledge.
Just do not sit on your butt, do something, man (I said that!)

That’s 2 pennies of wisdom of a reluctant immigrant.

Just some ideas

I try to write more often, so not to lose my ideas, what I want to say .
Unfortunately I cannot do it very often. I come home from work too late and too tired. Only Saturdays give me some creative time. Another time, I lose unfortunately some of my thoughts, some topics of conversation.

Yesterday I was thinking: it is very interesting how somebody with enough money and power can twist your reality and basically feed you with wrong ideas and convince you that black is white and white is black! How many people after being introduced to credit cards started to live above their means, spending more than they have, more than they earn?

The whole society turned into consumers and spenders. Credit card, consumer cards, loans, loans, loans. They still spend. That’s why, probably, I just love to watch “Till debt do us part” program on TV. It’s very educational, shows us to what extent we can be reckless. Big time.
People have an ingrained habit to spend much more than they can afford in reality and do not even think twice about the consequences of overspending and indulging themselves.
They do not even give themselves trouble to stop and think first, to sit and calculate basic needs and availability of income to cover those needs before spending. And not to mix needs and wants, they are different.

Credit card is a crutch, you might need this crutch if you are in business, but in private life you just need common sense and a little bit of calculation, very simple. Credit became very easy, even if we do not have ready credit, we can go to daddy or mommy (even if mommy is 70 years old and still working to supplement needs of extended family).

I do not think, it is right. 70 years old women (men) should not work, they should have a rest from any necessity of earning their keeps; they have to enjoy their “golden years”. They had enough working. We have to use our own creativity and talents and simply find ways to earn more if you need more, or just do not buy stuff, if you do not have money. Simplify your life or earn more. It’s my opinion. Well, may be as s stupid immigrant, I just do not get certain things.
May be there are obligations to a certain life style present, prestige, etc, etc. What Joneses would say? How I can possibly use public transportation, when I need a car? We forget, that there always will be need for more money. The more we spend – the more we need thatgreen thing. Money, money, money.

People cannot relax; have fun, we always think about money and work, work, work. Extra hours, extra money. The more you earn, the more you spend, the more you need to earn.
New car, furniture, house, dress, trinkets, lots of them.
Life becomes too stressful, rest almost nonexistent. Even when we sit, we still tense and wired, ready to jump and run.
That’s why probably, medical profession so profitable in this country. We all have some kind of a problem, that needs regular visits with our medical cards to a specialist, who without even looking into our way of life, stress, background, financial and personal problems, having only 10-15 minutes to talk to us, because he has 10,20,30 more patients behind the door waiting. He will give us pills that suppose to successfully cure us. All kinds of pills: white, blue, green, yellow. Two in the morning, three in the afternoon. No, sorry, three in the morning, two in the afternoon. Then at night two more.
Side effects? Another pill. Headache? More pills. We have enough pills for everybody. We can even bring you pills home and if you forget to take, we can phone and remind you to take a pill. Isn’t it lovely?
Somehow doctors conveniently forgot that there are lots of time tested natural remedies, many very cheap and effective and with no side effects. No-no, that won’t do, we want quick fix and doctors willingly shower us with pills, injections, sometimes, tummy tuck, face lift, breast augmentation, liposuction, stomach stapling.
Quick fix, they can fix you permanently and forever,( like they fixed Michael Jackson, I still can not get over his death, such talent and such tragic fate).
But I lost my point. I just wanted to say, that while living among abundance of everything people loose certain ability of thinking and analyzing. Instead they take everything by its face value, not trying to be cautious, not using their brains, may be just looking for fun, for quick fix, easy way out, or may be just not paying attention. I do not know, why it happens that way. We do not ask question: What if? Only when something happens, we start looking for answers and ask questions, but it might be too late then…

In my old country people never had such terrible addictions, like addiction to food, to prescription medication. I think it’s so horrible and disgusting. People basically eat themselves to death and kill themselves with medications that suppose to cure, not kill! We have to start ask more questions and demand more answers and not to trust every professionally looking guy or girl with our valet or health and everything else.
But it’s just my reluctant immigrant’s opinion. You do not have to listen.

Socialism (communism) or capitalism? Make your pick, please.

And do not ask Karl Marx, he did not have a clue!

Grass is greener on the other side. It’s 1000% rule, ladies and gentlemen. Most of people, who are clamoring about communism (and socialism), practically do not have a clue about reality of it.
They live happily or unhappily in their blissful ignorance in a society with substantial freedom of speech (and other freedoms). They can say and print whatever they want and other passers-by are so polite and unrestricted, that they can even buy these ramblings or have it for free and read it, no matter how crazy or damaging for they psyche it might be!
They (writers) sure have a nice apartment with running hot and cold water with separate taps for it. They have a nice habit of having a steaming cup of coffee in the morning or whenever they like it while dreaming about better society and writing all kinds of sounding-clever-on-paper things.
They have plenty of time to sit in a warm and cozy room and write about any clever or stupid ideas of theirs or somebody else’s! They can swear at government and politicians, blame presidents, living and dead ones.
They criticize everything and everybody knowing very well, that nobody will come and arrest them, no matter how long or how stubborn they ‘ve been barking at their own tree…
They have never been on the other side of the fence, that’s why it so easy for them to write…
So, please, guys stop blaming Mr. Obama with being pro-communist or pro-socialist and listen a little to the world of some reality or experience.
By stroke of destiny (or was it a joke of destiny) I had experience in both worlds. I was born into socialism, lived there in a small place near Baltic Sea, more like a spit on the map but this spit is my old country and I love it very much!
By the way, people who live there are great patriots and hard working and honest, though very confused sometimes and do not know whom to believe any more. They have been lied to and deceived by all kind of ideas so much! Now they do not know whom to believe to.
In 1992 I was transplanted into different country - Canada, into capitalism,(or so they call it here) without any idea what I am going to do and how I am going to survive (with 3 small kids of mine ) and a husband with absolutely grandioso ideas and no clue what to do with them (ideas, not kids).
My husband came first by invitation of a business partner (finally we were allowed to have a business in our country!) and decided to stay. I did not want to come, I was completely scared. It was 1990, “perestroika”, inflation, tremendous social changes, no stability. I was scared to leave, I was scared to stay… I did not know what to expect.
I did not want to become a reluctant immigrant, but I was afraid of possibility of civil war over there, I did not want to be hurt, not with children. There was such a possibility at that time. Everything was stirred in the society big time.
Now, looking back, after 17 years of living under capitalism, though with some socialistic features like free medical services and welfare (we did not have a welfare in my country, because we did not have unemployment at that time), I can tell you frankly: I am choosing this blamed capitalist system with all its faults and insecurity and economical turmoil.
It is more natural, more viable, more real. It can be cruel and mean if we allow ourselves to be weak and feeble. Sometimes it forces you to be creative and it’s definitely not perfect (no system is perfect, there is no such thing). You have to understand, how it works, you have to do a lot of learning if you want to flourish, not perish in it. But it has great potential and it is up to us, people, to make it work better, to change it, to grow in it and with it.
For people who believe that communism is better: well,socialism is Utopia, perfect world on paper, mean in reality.
At a certain point we believe in Santa Claus and Peter Pan but then we have to grow up and understand that people make system the way it is. If you do not like it, you can leave and go somewhere else or you can stay and try to make it better.
But if you are not allowed to do anything by you own will, if system controls everything in your life, yourself including, that kind of system is not livable and not human.
It is damaging, dangerous and is doomed. THAT IS MY OPINION. But I am just a reluctant immigrant, am I? So how can I judge?
By the way, if you never read George Orwell’s “1984”, you must read it. At a certain period of time(way before Gorbachev) in my country some people went to Siberia for 25 years just for having it on their bookshelf.
So you owe it to them to read it. It’s grotesque and very real at the same time. Grotesque for people, who never lived under communism and very real for people who did.
See you later guys.

Who am I?
Diaries of a Reluctant Immigrant



I came to Canada in the year 1992, cold damp February 22nd . I still remember as if it was yesterday. But how could I possibly forget? I should have started my diaries then. It was a big change. A huge one. To become an immigrant, just like that.

I came reluctantly to this country. I call myself Reluctant Immigrant. It’s my secret name. Not a secret anymore, because I‘ve just told you. Please, do not tell anybody, I do not want people to laugh at me.
I always wanted to be positive and proper and like everybody else. You see I came from a communist country. A former communist country.

Everything was falling apart in 1992. It was called “perestroika”, that means like ”renovation of a society”. Rebuilding. Politicians are notorious for inventing of beautiful meaningful names, that in reality carry very little sense or even quite different meaning. Just more hardship for simple people like me. Poor people became poorer and suddenly we had rich people too. In Russia they were called “novyie russkyie” – “new Russians.

I do not want you to be confused, I am not from Russia, though my native language is Russian. I was born and raised as an immigrant in a small place that belonged to a huge power. USSR. It was hard. Your grandparents were deprived of everything for socialist ideas; your parents were forced to fight for the same ideas. And now it is even harder to comprehend. What are you suppose to fight for? Where is that f* Promised Land? Where is prosperity and abundance for everybody as promised?
I went to my country in 1999 for a sad occasion. Everybody suddenly developed mass amnesia and conveniently forgot state language (Russian). Even currency is different now.What you are supposed to believe now?

It is very hard when there is no party line to tell you how to live. It’s even harder for a whole county, than for a single person, I think, because no one really knows what to do and how to live any more. Socialist values devaluated, others are yet to be learned. After everything is
destroyed what you believed in or tried to believe in .You have to build something completely different. Who can tell you what is right and what is wrong?
People are like a flock of scared sheep. Do not know where to run. And where the hell is the Sheppard? Trial and error began.

I ran away with my family. It was not easy. Was it worth it? I do not know. Sometimes I feel guilty. I feel that by running away, by becoming an immigrant again, I betrayed my country, I abandoned it. My poor beloved country, it is so poor now… 12% + unemployment and no money to pay international loans… People are disappointed and bitter and angry.
Some other time I will tell you about it but not today. I did not want to emigrate anywhere because I loved my country. It’s so small and beautiful. Clinging to the Baltic Sea, torn by national hatred and prejudice, old historical grudge and new hunger for freedom and better life and just plain hunger….
I did not want to become an immigrant. It’s just sometimes happens that you have to go, you just do not have a choice.
One day I might tell you about that too. When I feel like it and if you want to listen.

I love Canada too. When you live in a country long enough it sort of grows on you.
At first I did not like it at all. Too different, too alien, or was it me who was alien? I did not know then, I still don’t know now. It’s not easy to be an immigrant. I was a reluctant immigrant remember?
The one thing I know, that it is a good, decent sort of a country and I love it. Not as my own country, in a different way but still love it.
You can keep your dignity here and be yourself. You do not have to pretend and hide and it is a good thing. You do not have to be something you are not, you can be what you are and if you are nobody then you are nobody and no one cares.
You can live a very good life here and be happy as far as you can if you can. You have to work very hard and sometimes you achieve very little as a result…

People come here from different parts of the world and everybody wants a piece of good luck, but not everybody knows how to get it. There are lots of choices here, good and bad.
But if you are not very greedy, you can get whatever you want if you know what you want. But if you don’t, you can always learn.
Of course it’s better, when you come with some money, it helps a lot. But you can get something without money just the same, you just have to work harder and run longer so to speak.

They have lots of food in this country by the way. Not all of it good though. I might tell you one day about my experience with all that food, and the way I learned how to deal with that “plenty- ness” of it, because when you are from a communist country you have to learn not to be greedy when food is around..
Not just food, here, in this country you see the abundance of everything, human resources too. People come from different countries: rich, poor, educated, not very, knowing their goals, having not a foggiest idea why the hell did they come, persecuted in they own country, or just plain bored, bored to be rich, or tired to be poor, legal or illegal, black, white, yellow, clever, talented, stupid, dumb as a… you’ve got the idea.
Of course at first you have to get some money (if you do not have any already) and status (you can not be illegal forever, it might get on your nerves or on the nerves of the government and they might do something stupid like sending you back, for example).

How can you get the money? You can rob a bank of course, that’s what people usually do when they desperately need money (at least they constantly show it in the movies as a wise solution to financial problems). You can go to work too, only in that case it will take you a little bit longer and you might not get that much satisfaction. Again, the authorities might not like your illegal ways of earning money and intervene (those meddlers)!
Though nowadays they do not keep that much money handy at the banks either (that’s what they say I never had a chance to check it). I read about one dude who robbed the bank and got $500! He was mad! His gun cost more.
The problem in this country if you are an immigrant, you have to have a certain amount of money to live on. First of all you have to pay rent and it is not cheap unless you agree to live in a closet with lots of people around in one place, it’s called shared accommodation and it is still not that cheap, though it is cheaper than a normal apartment.

But then I am not sure how legal it is. Normally you are supposed to rent one bedroom apartment if you are single. If you are trying to save some money and renting somebody’s basement, you better be a corpse. Are you asking why? Just read any rental ad in a newspaper: no pets, no kids, no smoking, drinking, no parties, prefer truck driver (one that absent all the time). No, guys, just rent to a corpse, he is not going to smoke, may be stink a little…
Seriously, if you have another grown up member of your family living with you, you are supposed to rent 2 bedroom apartment, even if you have enough space in one bedroom, they just do nor let you rent it (by my experience). If you do not have a well-paid job or you are on a single income with several people you support, you’ll be paying for rent practically all your earned money at least in a big city like Toronto. If you live in a small town, that’s another problem. Problem you can express in two words: NO JOBS. Especially not for an immigrant, not for a stupid reluctant immigrant with alien education. And education from a communist country is considered very alien even if it is very good by any standards! You just cannot prove it.
Of course you can live under a bridge, may be. Never tried. Might be kinda cold in winter. But some people do survive that way. Still I think it’s easier to survive here in this country than back there.
You really have to be very smart to survive in a communist country! First of all you have to learn how to be politically correct from early age (the earlier the safer for you)!
When I came to Canada we moved to the small town. I knew nothing about anything. Unemployment, hostility of provincial people towards aliens (I mean stupid immigrants), and I do not blame them. If you speak with an accent or do not speak English at all, then you look pretty dumb, it’s a fact. Then isolation... I have lived in a small town in Canada for almost 10 years, I know, what I am talking about.
You may ask: why didn’t I leave it and didn’t go to a bigger city? That’s another story...
Now I live in Toronto in a relatively inexpensive (for my area) very run down, screaming about renovations apartment with my two kids, one a student, another still in search for his place in life. In order to have some food (for my two cats too) I have to have another job on Sundays. In my area apartments are not very cheap. Well I am not complaining, as long as I have a job, I will be fine, but for how long? Right now I work, it’s a good thing and with some moonlighting I survive. I am very lucky, am I?
Nowadays it becomes harder and harder for an immigrant to get a job even in a big city like Toronto, because lots of manual low paid half-legal (under the table) jobs just disappeared together with half-legal employment agencies providing them.
So if you do not have very required skills or talents, it becomes harder and harder to get something that looks like a job!

That can be very stressful for people who lost their jobs or who are in the process of loosing it, or who are just thinking: who’s next? Please, not me!
Hopefully global economical down spiral will get better and people will learn how to get by with lot less and how not to waste resources and be more frugal.
Actually, when you are from communist background, certain things can be very difficult for you in a different system, for example, it is harder to feel independent, not to be afraid of authorities, to trust the law, to become a businessman (businesswoman).
At the same time to be frugal, to save, to pinch pennies for most immigrant people like me from modes background comes quite naturally. That’s what you had to do in your old country to survive. Socialist system gives you more security (even if it is a false one), no unemployment, almost no firing, your job is guaranteed to you, same as pension and free medical help, “free” (well, you are not paying from your pocket) education, and so on and so forth, but, no it is a BIG BUT! It’s rather a false security, because equal pay (salary) to everybody translates into a very miserably small salary for everybody. And if you did not read George Orwell:”1994”,I am begging you, please read. You will appreciate your country more and you will learn, that : ”Some people are more equal than others!” It will definitely help you with self-esteem.

Cheap housing translates into sharp unavailability of this housing.
You have to wait for 25 years to get 2 rooms (not bedrooms) apartment for your family without hot water or build a house with no money to do that like my parents did, sacrificing everything in a process (like food, clothing, rest, health basically and so on). So you’ll learn to be frugal big time! Well I crawl from under breaking Iron Wall (it was not iron after all) and came to Canada.
When I came to Canada I was so surprised that so many people here live above their means (credit cards galore) and so many of them just waste a lot of everything. Water, money, electricity, as if there was no tomorrow.
I remember that popular saying: “Buy more – save more.” People were busy into spending. Even at school here in Canada, I remember at my son’s class third grade or second, they would build pyramids from sugar and flour and painted it with colors and after class was over, they threw away everything. I am not saying that they should have eaten that, but still…To see that for a reluctant immigrant from the county were food was sacred and never plenty was more than strange!
So after more than 10 years in Canada, being a legal citizen of it, do I want to go home? You bet! Am I going? No way!
Whatever problems are here, over there they are hundred times bigger! Do I want to be part of that mess? No, I am not a hero and I do not believe I can change anything there, that’s the point. And I do not like discrimination and racism.
So whether I am reluctant immigrant or not, I am staying. Reluctantly. And please do not ask me to leave, because I won’t.
Long live Canada, my family and the Queen, naturally.
Have a nice day, everybody. Till next time.